Application Lifecycle Management

Modern apps need a modern lifecycle

For years, Visual Studio has enabled software development organizations to break free of rigid, process-oriented application lifecycles that isolate development, testing, project management and operations teams. Microsoft’s approach to Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) provides a flexible and agile environment that adapts to your team’s needs, removes barriers between roles, and streamlines processes so you can focus on delivering high-quality software faster and more efficiently. In a world where software development is increasingly critical to business success, the ALM principles embodied by Visual Studio are more relevant than ever.

Agile

Visual Studio ALM provides you with the tools and flexibility needed to run your agile teams. Drag-and-drop backlog management paired with configurable Kanban boards let you prioritize and visualize the important work for each team contributing to your project. Out of the box Scrum support will help you plan sprints, manage team capacity, and keep track of progress with taskboards and burndown charts. And customizable dashboards let you ensure everyone has visibility to the value your teams are delivering.

Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC) provides you the control and features you need to centrally manage your code. Support thousands of developers inside a single repository with advanced branching, merging and visualization capabilities, manage permissions at any level of your codebase, and full support for regulatory compliance needs to support auditing at any level.

Test

Visual Studio provides tools to help your team with test automation, manual and exploratory test passes, and load and performance runs. Capture rich information in context to allow you to reproduce bugs and ensure quality throughout the development process. Automatically generate test cases from exploratory runs, create and manage multiple test configurations, and record user actions with screen and voice capture to improve reproducibility of trouble spots in your apps.

Release

The faster your software is deployed, the quicker you can get feedback. With release management in Visual Studio you can configure, approve and deploy your applications for any environment. Create automated deployment orchestrations for each environment no matter how complex the configuration. Delivering your software more frequently and easily to an environment allows your testers to get to work validating your system and keeps your stakeholders involved in giving feedback.

Cross-platform

If your team is developing software for different platforms and uses a variety of developer tools, such as Eclipse and Xcode, the entire development team can still take advantage of a single, unified and flexible collaboration environment with Application Lifecycle Management services in Visual Studio Online or Team Foundation Server.

Team Explorer Everywhere brings the power of Team Foundation Server and Visual Studio Online to teams developing in Eclipse. Connect to team projects on premises or in the cloud for complete access to your source code, backlogs, and build capabilities for non-Windows platforms.

Visual Studio’s global partner ecosystem also provides a wealth of additional cross-platform capabilities, such as Xamarin for building native applications on Android and iOS devices reusing your .NET code and skills, and fully integrated with Visual Studio.

Related Resources

Gartner Positions Microsoft in the Application Development Life Cycle Management (ADLM) Leaders Quadrant

Gartner, a leading industry analyst firm, evaluated 16 vendors based on their completeness of vision and ability to execute in the Magic Quadrant for Application Development Life Cycle Management (ADLM).

ALM Assessment

How Artizone used Visual Studio to deliver a continuous flow of value

The integrated Visual Studio ALM solution has reduced development cycle times and sped up the resolution of production bugs. Most importantly, Artizone now has the flexibility to deliver exactly the features their customers need.